He pats my back. “Perfect.”
We get back in the truck, and I crank the heat up as we both sit there and shiver.
“Hopefully a plow comes by soon,” he says.
“Yeah, well, we shouldn’t be driving home in this.” I prop my feet up on the dash.
“It’ll be fine.”
“No.”
“What do you meanno?”
“I’d rather sleep in the truck,” I scoff.
His brown eyes widen, like he thinks I’m going to say I’m joking, but I’m not.
“You don’t trust me?” he asks.
“I trust you. I don’t trust the conditions.”
“Addison, it’s—”
“No!” I object. I want absolutely no part of driving in snow, especially with towing a twenty-foot trailer behind us.
Wesley stays quiet, doesn’t argue. We watch the traffic slowly creep down the road in silence. The snow is still coming down sideways; it’s a whiteout. The cab of the truck has a weird energy now. I shouldn’t have yelled at him, but I’m sorta uptight, I guess. We should’ve been home by now.
He dabbles on his phone. “Guess I’ll call my dad, tell him we’re going to be stuck here for a while.”
I do the same. Opening our family group chat, I text everyone. “Stuck in snow, we’re about 2 hours away and stopping.”
After I hit send, I go back to the list of conversations. My eyes fix on Brantley’s name. I open the thread and read the last few texts we shared back and forth about this trip. Right before he decided to dump me over the phone.
The urge to tell Wesley more about the breakup surfaces. That it wasn’tjustmy anxiety. That Brantley was sorta growing jealous of Wesley.
I battle the idea of telling Wes. It’s not like I have anything to lose. He can say and think whatever he wants now.
When he gets off the phone, we sit in silence for a beat longer. Something between us shifted during this trip; our friendship feels different than before.
Wesley turns on the overhead light. “Addison.” His is voice full of something I can’t place. I turn to him and his eyes are soft and studying mine. “What’s going on with us right now?”
I shrug my heavy shoulders. “I don’t know.”
“Are you mad at me?
“No?” I scowl, confused. “Why would you think that?”
“Well, you’d probably still be in a relationship if you hadn’tcome on this trip, no?”
“Not necessarily,” I mutter, playing with my hands.
“How?”
I take in a deep breath. “I kinda lied earlier,” I admit and look at him. He just blinks back at me. “Brantley was jealous of you, our relationship. Not in the beginning, but recently. It wasn’tjustmy anxiety that was bothering him.”
He adjusts himself in his seat, leaning back against his door. “He told you this?”
I nod. “Yeah. I told him we’re just good friends and that’s it. I didn’t know how else to explain it,” I say. “All he would ever say was howfriends don’t do thisandfriends don’t do that,” I mock.
